Sunday, May 3, 2009

Garden Miracles

My stepmother, Gloria, came for a visit this weekend to save my garden from my unskilled hands. I wanted to do something nice before Michele came home and she took pity on my yard, and me, and came out and worked miracles.

This is the left side of my planting area before Gloria's green thumbs, fingers, elbows, etc. etc. got ahold of it. This bed contained lots of weeds, one pitiful, bonsai-esque bush, and three savagely pruned bush wannabes. For some reason, Gloria has made me promise never to prune anything, ever, for any reason. I'm not sure why. In fact, my pruners seem to have gone missing. I know she couldn't have gotten them on the plane with her, so they must be hidden around here somewhere!

This is that same side now. Isn't it an amazing transformation! I'm actually responsible for the disappearance of the three pruning victims. I got to whip out my power tools and made quick work of getting rid of those. The rest was all Gloria.

We did most of the work in this bed on Friday afternoon. Then on Saturday, we added the blocks to protect the flowers from my insane lawnmowing skills. Then, in a fit of midnight gardening, we added the Marigolds - in the dark! I looked this morning, and they looked great!On Friday, we also tackled the right side. This is how it looked before. Pretty barren and dead, right? Well, take a look at the "after."

We even lined the walkway with annuals and perennials - and I even know what those are now!

Michele and I now have one of the most envied yards on the street. In fact, a lady drove by and said that and we'd barely even started. We have azaleas and rhododendrons, and a whole bunch of other plants and flowers that I can't remember the name of - oh, wait, Marigolds, of course. And, we planted a Japanese Flowering Quince in the middle of the front yard - and I dug the hole for it!

We also put in a vegetable garden in the back yard. I picked out all the seeds and planted most of them, too! I'm calling it my salad garden, as I am growing tomatoes (not from seed), bell peppers (also, not from seed), cucumbers, zucchini, beans (not like kidney beans, but green beans, wax beans, and some purple/black green bean shaped beans), lettuce (five different kinds - and from seed! who ever knew lettuce had seeds!), and, of course, the crowning glory of the entire garden, CARROTS!!!!!! I can't wait to eat a carrot that I grew with my own two hands!!

Now my only task is to figure out the lawn. My favorite quote from the entire weekend was when Gloria said, "You all sure don't have much grass in your lawn." My second favorite quote is when Michele and I said, "Hey, if it's green and it's growing, it's grass!" And, yes, we both said it. I, in response to Gloria, and Michele later on the phone when I told her what Gloria said - hey, we're both Geminis named Michel(l)e, we can't help but think alike!! It is true, though, our lawns are full of weeds. I know I could poison them to get rid of the weeds, but I just don't like the thought of that. So, we'll probably keep considering everything growing out there grass and just leave it alone. Hey, at least the dandelions are my favorite color.

It was a wonderful weekend and I learned so much! I consider myself a gardener now, albeit a nervous one who has been banned from pruning. Thanks Gloria!! My skills and our garden are much improved!!